


For One Night Only

by emperorpenguin (dortmundbvbbabe)



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Fluff and Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-03
Updated: 2018-03-03
Packaged: 2019-03-26 08:32:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,804
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13853970
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dortmundbvbbabe/pseuds/emperorpenguin
Summary: Travis is dumb. He told his mother that he was dating someone to get her off the topic of setting him up, and not just anyone, Ivan. Instead of being able to wait a little while and say they broke up, the Flyers head to Ottawa and Travis's mother is dead set on meeting Ivan. Being the great friend that Ivan is, he agrees to be Travis's boyfriend for just that one night. But that's the problem, isn't it? One night seems way too short.





	For One Night Only

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Brennuvargur](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Brennuvargur/gifts).



> I was so, so happy when I saw that these were two of your choices. I love the Flyers boys and I'm such a sucker for a lot of these same tropes. Who doesn't love a fake dating AU? I really hope you enjoy and thanks for the great inspiration!!

Travis doesn’t know why he said it.  _ Wait, no.  _ He  _ knows  _ why he said it. Worse yet, he knows that Simms knows why he said it and that almost makes it worse, like Travis had been caught doing something wrong and was now facing a disappointed parent. Which is what would  _ actually  _ happen if this whole thing unraveled.

It was a mix of poor foresight and feeling cornered that Travis told his parents he was dating Ivan. For a while, his mother had been preoccupied with Chase’s dating life. He was older single and closer to home and for those reasons, Travis had largely been spared his mother’s concern about his personal life. Then Chase got a girlfriend, and as a brother, Travis was happy for him, but also as a brother, he knew what was going to follow. He was in the middle of Skyping his parents when his mom brought the subject up and Travis knew it was going to be the start of something and he didn’t want to be forced on some date when he returned to London, either during a break or by the time summer came around. So when his mother broached the subject, talking about the neighbor’s granddaughter, Travis knew that he’d be dodging this line of inquiry. 

“I’m actually dating someone,” Travis said.

There was a pause on the other side of the line and for a moment, Travis wondered if Skype had froze. 

“Really?” His mother said with a hint of hope creeping into her voice. 

“Yeah, I mean it’s kind of new, but going well so far…” Travis said. There was a part of him that felt guilty, he didn’t like lying to his parents, but he also didn’t want his mother acting as a matchmaker behind his back. 

“Well, tell me about her,” his mother said.

“Uh, it’s actually Ivan,” Travis said, blurting out the first name that popped into his mind.

“Ivan… Provorov?” 

“Yeah, I mean you knew this was always a possibility,” Travis said. He’d come out to his parents the summer before being drafted. They had been supportive, albeit concerned about how his sexual orientation would impact his future, but since then he hadn’t had an interest in dating anyone, male or female, and the topic had been curbed. 

“Of course, I mean, that’s great,” his mom said after the shock ebbed away.

“It’s still early on but, you know, it’s going well.”

“I’m so happy for you,” his mom said and her enthusiasm caused him to feel even guiltier. 

“Yeah, well, I have to go, but, um, yeah, so maybe don’t plan anything with Mrs. Johnson’s granddaughter.”

“I won’t. Hey, since you’re coming to Ottawa next week, why don’t you invite him to dinner. We can take you both out, get to know him better.”  
_Fuck_. Travis hadn’t thought far ahead in this poorly conceived plan, but he certainly hadn’t expected his mother to act on it. “We’re not really at that stage,” Travis said.

“Well, your father got to get to know him during the Dad’s Trip,” his mom said.

“Yeah, but not like that, Ivan’s dad was here, too,” Travis said.

“So then we’ll both get to know him better,” his mom said as if that put an end to the argument. One thing that Travis was certain of when he ended the call was that he was fucked. 

 

So Travis ended up telling Simms what had happened. To be fair if he was aiming for a non-judgemental opinion, Simms was the last person he should go to. But Simms was also the one in a stable relationship and the person who had pretty much taken Travis under his wing as a rookie so it wasn’t like he would completely disavow him. Simms had just stared at him blankly when Travis conveyed what he had done before laughing hysterically at Travis’s expense. 

“So Ivan has no idea?” Simms asked.

“Nope,” Travis said.

“What did you think would happen?”

“Obviously I didn’t  _ think _ , but I don’t know, I guess wait a little while and then say we broke up.”

“That is the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. You have to tell him, man,” Simms said as he tried to catch his breath from laughing so hard. 

“No,” Travis said.

“It’s either him or your parents. Do you really want poor Ivan to be clueless when he runs into your family and they think that he’s with you.”

“...No, but,” Travis started.

“Exactly, so that’s why you have to tell him.”

Travis just glared. “Okay tell him or I will.”

“What? I came to you in confidence.”  
“I know, but now this doesn’t just involve you, but Ivan as well. Look he’s your friend, Travis. It’ll be fine. But did you ever think why you said Ivan’s name.”

Travis just glared. 

 

 _It won’t be fine_. Travis things as he headed to Ivan’s room. They used to share together last year but now with the addition of some of the guys from Lehigh and Nolan they’ve only done it a handful of times. He knocked on the door apprehensively and Jordan opened the door unsuspectingly. “Hey, TK.”  
“Hey, is Ivan here?” 

“Uh, yeah, why?” 

“Would you mind giving us a few minutes? I think Leiersy and a few others are playing NHL in his room if you want to join them.”

“Uh, yeah, sure.”

Travis entered the room hesitantly. He knew that Simms was right since the situation pertained to Ivan, he was entitled to know about it. But damn if it wasn’t going to be painfully embarrassing for him.

“Hey, is everything okay?” Ivan asked after he saw the pale look on Travis’s face, that mixed with the fact that he’d pretty much kicked Jordan out of their room was probably not a good sign.

“Uh, so you know how we’re heading to Ottawa, and my parents are coming to visit.”  
“That’ll be great,” Ivan said, but when he saw the downcast look on Travis’s face his smile went away. “That isn’t good?”

“No, it is it is, it’s just they think that we’re dating.”

The other shoe dropped. Ivan just stared at him. 

“Why?”

“BecauseImighthavetoldthemweweredating,” Travis blurted out, “I’m sorry, my mom was just pressuring me about dating someone and I didn’t think, obviously I didn’t think.”  
“So… guys are a thing?” Ivan asked.

In all of this he’d forgotten that not everybody had known that he was bi.

“Uh, yeah, I mean my parents knew, shit, I mean that’s not a problem for you, right?”

“No, no, I just didn’t know,” Ivan said with a smile that made Travis feel like everything was almost going to be okay.

“I mean I’ll tell my parents the truth, I just didn’t want you to be shocked if my Dad or Mom mentioned something.”

“Or I could pretend?”

“What?”  
“I mean, this would probably hurt your parents and I can tell that you’re feeling really bad about this, so we can pretend for the day, and then after a few weeks you can tell them that we broke up.” 

“Why would you do that?” Travis asked.

“Because you’re my friend… and because you would owe me free drinks for years.”  
_Free drinks, like what a boyfriend would- No, he was doing it because they were friends_. 

“Are you sure?” Travis asked.

“My ex's parents have loved me. It will be fine.”

 

As they got closer to going to Canada trip, Travis became progressively nervous. He’d checked with Ivan multiple times in case he’d changed his mind, but despite all this Ivan was the calmer of the two. They’d vaguely agreed that they’d gotten together after winter break one night and were still kind of testing things out. 

“They’re going to want to take us out for dinner,” Travis said.

“I kind of figured. Just think, it’ll be this dinner and then you can go on about how heartbroken you are after we ‘break up’.” 

Ivan didn’t know just how on the money he was about that. Despite all this chaos, it was almost as though Travis and Ivan were playing house. Seeing him interact and charm his parents would only illuminate what could have been, but Travis knew that there was a big difference between supporting a LGBT friend and being LGBT. 

The win in Ottawa didn’t even register with Travis when he knew the dinner was set to follow. His parents hadn’t wanted to wait for them to finish in the stadium so they had just given Travis the address for the restaurant that they had agreed upon and after the media rounds and changed. They sat a good foot away from each other in the taxi, but a few minutes into the drive, Ivan reached over to gently tap the back of his hand reassuringly. 

“It’ll be fine,” Ivan said. But it wasn’t going to be fine. Even if they survived the meal unscathed, Travis would deal with the consequences not only with his family, but also with what would happen afterwards. 

“I hope so,” Travis said.

 

His parents were already seated at the table waiting for them when they arrived. Instinctively, Ivan put his hand on the small of Travis’s back to guide him to where they were sitting. For a moment his parents scrutinized Ivan with the utmost interest before relaxing into pleasant conversation. 

“You didn’t mention anything when I came for the Dad’s Trip,” Travis’s father said.

“Dad…”  
“It’s still pretty new, Mr. Konecny,” Ivan said, “We didn’t want to really tell anybody while we were trying things out.”

Travis swallowed. 

“How did you two get together?” Travis’s mother asked.

Travis looked over at Ivan for any cues. They had talked about this before in vague details before but their story hadn’t been fully fleshed out. “You know how we were really close last year, right? We were rooming together and it was just natural being rookies together. But this year we weren’t the rookies anymore and we were kind of busy taking making sure everybody was adjusting so we didn’t spend so much time together. And I realized I missed him. He was right here and I missed him and I realized that I didn’t want us to be friends anymore.”

Travis could feel Ivan staring right at him and felt his cheeks flush. He’d gone beyond what they’d discussed yet all of it was true. He  _ missed _ Ivan. He wanted to be with Ivan and that’s what made this all so hard because it was just a facade. Ivan sitting next to him, being in a relationship, that felt so normal. Even as he finished saying it, his stomach dropped. He hadn’t realized how much he had wanted it until he started saying it out loud. This is what Simms had meant. If Travis was really in a bind, he could have picked any of the single guys: Jordan, Nolan, but he picked  _ Ivan _ . 

The rest of dinner went well. There were small signs of affection between Travis and Ivan. None that would raise any red flags on Twitter or Instagram, but a carefully placed hand on the back, or a gentle, reassuring squeeze.

Travis thought by the end of this, he’d feel better. His mom and dad seemed satisfied by meeting Ivan and he knew that his parents wouldn’t bug him about dating at least for a while. But after Travis had paid the bill, he’d insisted since after all  _ he  _ was the one in the NHL. His mom hugged Ivan goodbye in the type of hug that was usually reserved for family members taking both Ivan and Travis off guard. “We’ll see you soon, okay,” his mom said before hugging Travis one more time.

Travis and Ivan chose to walk back to their hotel, it was closer to the restaurant than the stadium, but still they walked briskly in the chilly wintry weather. They walked in silence until they were out of sight of Travis’s parents. 

“So you’ve been single for a while, huh?” Ivan asked.

“Yeah, but they had Chase to worry about,” Travis said with a sigh. “Now they’ve turned their attention to me.”  
“Why are you single?” Ivan asked.

“I mean, probably for the same reasons you are, right?” Travis said, “And probably because, you know, can’t really date a guy in the NHL right now.”

Ivan just kind of hummed. An odd silence loomed over them until they returned to their hotel. The elevator ride up was quiet and Travis hated this silence that seemed so foreign to them. “Hey, thanks again for doing this.”

Ivan laughed, “You owe me.”

“Yeah, I’ll buy you dinner when we get back to Philly.” There it was out there. To Travis’s own ears it sounded an awful lot like a date. Ivan’s eyes widened, but he quickly blinked. 

“No, no dinner necessary.” Travis hated the disappointment that set in.

They headed towards Ivan’s room and Travis was ready to wish him good night when Ivan paused. 

“That was just for your parents, right?” Ivan asked. 

Travis shoved his hands deep into his pockets, “Yeah, it’s what we’d talked about before, right? It’s not weird now, right?”

“No, we’re good,” Ivan said, but there was almost something bitter in his voice. 

 

Travis meant to go to sleep, but he was awake replaying that entire night in his head. He wondered if he imagined Ivan’s interest or disappointment at times. He knew that it was probably just optimistic thinking but he also knew that after tonight he wanted to be with Ivan. 

He pulled out his phone and texted Simms.  _ I did something stupid didn’t I? _

It took a few moments before Simms replied.  _ With Ivan? Or by texting me at 2am? BOTH _ .

Travis sighed and knew that he’d be on the receiving end of some sleepy glares in the morning. 

The odd tension from the night carried over to breakfast when Ivan wouldn’t even look at Travis. If anything Travis was the one who should have been mortified by the evening, but this was different. All the vets noticed and Simms kept glancing between the two of them challenging TK to fix it. 

“Hey, uh, can we talk later?” Travis asked as the piled into the bus for practice. 

“Don’t think there’s much to talk about,” Ivan said and put his headphones in his ears signaling the conversation was over. Travis followed him and took the seat next to him despite Ivan ignoring him.

“For what it’s worth, uh, it may have been for my parents, but I wanted it to be real.”

Ivan didn’t reply and Travis wondered if he had heard until he saw that Ivan’s iPod wasn’t playing any music. So he just got up and headed towards the back of the bus for the rest of the ride.

 

Travis wasn’t expecting anything else. In fact, he was expect Ivan to practically ignore his existence, but Ivan just kept shooting him glances at practice, sometimes looking like he wanted to say something but didn’t. Travis had slept on the flight to Montreal and had headed to his room waiting for Nolan to join him, but was surprised when the door opened and Ivan came in.

“Hi,” Travis said.

“Hi, I’m sorry I didn’t react well earlier, but you were right we need to talk,” Ivan paused, waiting for Travis to start but for the first time since Ivan had met him, Travis was speechless. “Was what you told your parents real? About missing me and wanting to be with me?”

“Ivan…”  
“Just answer the question,” Ivan pleaded.

“Yeah, it was true,” Travis said.

Ivan relaxed visibly and a spark of hope ignited in Travis, “Since when?” 

“I guess since I realized you weren’t mine.”

“For me it’s been since last Christmas,” Ivan confessed. 

“What?” Travis asked. It all seemed almost too good to be true. 

“Come on, do you think I would have agreed if I didn’t have feelings for you. That was the stupidest thing I’ve ever done for someone,” Ivan whined.

Travis had broken out into a full grin now, “Yeah? Funny, I thought that was the closest I’d get to actually being with you.”

Ivan pulled him close and kissed him. It wasn’t the best in terms of first kisses, but something just felt so natural about it as Travis pulled Ivan down to make it a little easier. 

“That was… good,” Travis said. 

Ivan smiled back, “Yeah, but this just means you’ll have to lie to your parents some more.”

Travis looked at him confused.

“You can’t actually tell them we got together when I pretended to be your boyfriend.”

Travis shrugged, “The truth will probably come out eventually, besides, it’s not like what I said wasn’t true, we just took a roundabout way.”

 

  
  
  
  



End file.
